said Dave Jesson, an environmental scientist in the air division of EPA Region 9. The predictions don't consider long-term inversions or other unfavorable meteorological factors, which the basin deals with regularly, Jesson said. Gail Ruderman Feuer, senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Los Angeles, agreed that the data used to develop the predictions had changed from data used to develop the last air quality plan finalized in 1994. Feuer said SCAQMD modelers replaced the worst episode days (when the area exceeds the ozone standard for more than one hour) with more favorable information. SCAQMD's Atwood said the revised data are attributable to improvements in the underlying databases, control technology assessments, and analytical tools over the past seven years. The 1997 plan represents a "mid-course correction," the board added. Nicholas Hazelwood, the advisory council chair who did not sign the resignation letter, said the proposal's predictions are right on target: "I don't think there is any data to say that our pollution levels are getting worse."
Five smoggiest areas The South Coast Basin tops the list of U.S. areas out of attainment for ozone during 1993-1995, according to preliminary EPA data. Rank reflects the average number of days/year each area violated the standard (Ihour, 0.12 ppm).
Ozone levels in the past few years have gone down and the areas of impact have gotten smaller, he said, thanks to the successes of previous board regulations. After a series of public hearings, the board will vote on the proposed air quality management plan in November. The advisers noted that most of the actions proposed to reduce emissions won't occur until after 2000. "Vacillation now [concerning measures needed to reduce ozone
and particulate matter] is likely to increase the long-term cost of attaining healthful air," they wrote. Reactions to the advisers' letter revealed a split among the board members, and several expressed relief that the advisers had resigned. Some considered it "a breath of fresh air" and looked forward to finding a new roster of scientific advisers who are "more sympathetic to business interests," Atwood said. But at least two board members expressed dismay over the resignations, and one called for an investigation of the former advisers' criticisms. Environmentalists said that for the past three or four years, SCAQMD positions have indicated a shift toward protecting business interests. "We're not suggesting that you should ignore business interests, but they shouldn't be the driving force," said Tim Carmichael, Coalition for Clean Air policy director. The shift "is ironic because the country has made a U-turn," Hall added. "The public has realized that they want clean air and water. We are a little behind the rest of the country, and that is unusual." —CATHERINE M. COONEY
Funding uncertainty may delay Superfund cleanups The reauthorization of the Hazardous Substances Superfund Trust Fund may drive the Superfund reauthorization battle in the next Congress. The taxes, which support EPA's Superfund program, expired in December 1995. Chair Bill Archer (R-Tex.) of the House Ways and Means Committee refused to reauthorize the tax until Congress passes a Superfund reform bill, something the Democrats and Republicans were not able to agree on this year. EPA Administrator Carol Browner has repeatedly complained that because the taxes were not reauthorized, the agency might have to scale back cleanup work. The trust fund, created in 1980 by Congress, is supported by an annual excise tax on petroleum, imported refined products and certain hazardous chemicals and by an environmental income tax on corporations If the taxes are not reautho-
rized, within 18-24 months EPA will have to reconsider whether it will begin any new Superfund cleanups or cease adding sites to the National Priorities List (NPL), said William Ross, Superfund reform advocate in the Office of Emergency and Remedial Response. At existing sites, officials will evaluate steps to mitigate or stabilize the pollution. For instance instead of continuing with long-term groundwater cleanups, EPA would consider installing SlfiTOS 111 3.IT 3X63. warning residents
not to drink the groundwater Ross said Sites with surface contamination might be fenced off until work resumed Ross admitted that this is a worst-case scenario adding that Congress may reauthorize the tax this fall before In July, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated that the lapse in tax collection should not affect EPA's Superfund work
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until 2001, if cleanup costs from responsible parties and interest earnings are collected. The figures were reported in a letter from CBO to Sen. Robert Smith (R-N.H), chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Superfund, Waste Control, and Risk Assessment. Relying on CBO's figures, Smith assured Browner that Superfund should be able to operate at its current level for several V63XS "This should allay your near-term regarding the availability of continued stable funding to run the program " Smith wrote According to CBO Congress annually appropriates $1 34 billion to the Superfund program of which $250 million comes from the federal treasury At the end of this month the trust fund will have tt billion in unannropriaterl funds nH a balanre of "R5 9 h'l l'nn "E ifth t st funds r short of cash, Congress could
choose to fund the program from the general fund indefinitely," CBO Director June O'Neill wrote. But CBO's calculations did not sit well with EPA officials, who said the tax loss is $4 million a day, plus interest, to the trust fund, based on the $1.5 billion EPA collected in FY95. EPA estimates it can sustain its current level of funding through the end of FY99. The long-term future of the tax depends on the outcome of next month's elections. In August, while on his preconvention whistle-stop tour, President Clinton called on Congress to reinstate the tax. Still, many in Congress are unwilling to do so without first overhauling the program. Oil and chemical manufacturers that pay heavily into the tax oppose it and are likely to continue to fight for its demise. Bill Bresnick, environmental affairs representative for Texaco Inc., said oil producers provide more than half of the fund's annual income, a sum that far exceeds any liability the companies may have incurred. If the funds run dry, some industry representatives believe that state Superfund programs will take over NPL site cleanups. Many states are interested in taking on more responsibility for directing Superfund cleanups, said Robbie Roberts, executive director of the Environmental Council of States. "But the states do not want to be left holding the bag financially, " Roberts said. —CATHERINE M. COONEY
International body moves forward on controlling greenhouse gas emissions Future international treaties on global climate change—negotiated after 2000—should include legally binding targets instead of voluntary goals, according to the final declaration of the Second Conference of the Parties to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC), held in Geneva in July. The United States endorsed this goal, and Timothy Wirth, State Department undersecretary for global affairs announced that the United States supports reductions in climate change tlint HI*6 "realistic verifiable and binding " However he provided no specifics on how extensive the emissions reductions should be or when they should take effect The principle of binding reductions, supported by most delegates and many environmental groups but not a full consensus, was included in the Geneva Declaration, the final product of the conference. The declaration is one in a series of international agreements issued as part of the United Nation's call in 1990 to address the need to control greenhouse gases. It is a nonbinding statement of the attending ministers intended to lay out the direction for discussions at next year's conference in Kyoto Japan where negotiators are expected to make specific commitments The first declaration was
State "Superfund" programs expand State Superfund programs have made significant progress in standardizing cleanup requirements and using risk assessment methods to determine the standards, according to an annual report on state Superfund programs released in July by the Environmental Law Institute (ELI), a nonprofit research group. According to ELI, in 1995,44 states had some kind of cleanup program in place for hazardous waste sites not listed on the federal National Priorities List, up from 22 states in 1989. As many as 24 states have promulgated their own cleanup standards, up from 5 in 1989; and 45 states report using risk assessment methods to calculate cleanup decisions at hazardous waste sites. Forty-three states have retroactive liability provisions, which impose cleanup responsibility on any party that contributed to the pollution before enactment of the state law. The same standard applies to the federal Superfund. Republican leaders tried to soften this and other liability provisions in their Superfund bills but met stiff opposition from congressional Democrats and the White House. For a copy of "An Analysis of State Superfund Programs: 50-State Study, 1995 Update," call ELI at (202) 939-3248.
signed by the heads of state during the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, a nonbinding document that committed signatories to achieve voluntary targets and schedules. During that meeting, delegates from the European Union pushed for more binding commitments to be included, but delegates from the United States refused to go along. The Geneva Declaration calls for a flexible, free-market approach to achieving the reductions, including "joint implementation" of emissions credit trading among countries. It calls for the emissions reductions to begin as early as 2005, but no specific targets or timetables were set. V\firth said the United States hopes to provide concrete proposals during the next meeting of negotiators in December. But industry groups that attended the conference as observers disagreed that tougher, more binding language is necessary. Industry groups have consistently attacked the science behind global climate change. The most recent focus has been the second report released in July by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the panel of international scientists charged with assessing the state of global climate change. The report states there is a "discernible human influence on global climate" and that "the chemical composition of the atmosphere is being altered by anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases " Some industry groups including the Global Climate Coalition (GCC) which reDresents utilities and other industries that burn or minp fossil fiipk allppp that the rpnort altered to tone down the uncertainties originally expressed by the authors. GCC and other opr
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tific consensus on global warmingt Several groups also complain will cripple the U.S. economy. But to Wirth, the statements in the second IPCC report are "remarkable." According to State Department officials, the move to
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